Now we know why Tom Brady built a moat around his new mansion. It’s to keep angry quarterbacks and their infuriated agents out.

They’d like to breach the fortress and ask Brady just what the heck he’s doing.

He just restructured his contract so the Patriots will have more salary-cap space. Brady will be paid about half the going rate for superstar quarterbacks.

“I really do just want to win,” he said.

That’s all well and good, his colleagues would say. But why did you have to make us look bad in the process?

First, it was never Brady’s intention. Second, he can’t help it. He’s Tom Brady.

Mr. Handsome. Fashion Icon. Supermodel wife on his arm. Next to Brady, every male looks like Iggy Pop.

Other than the occasional kick to Ed Reed’s leg, everything about the guy is impeccable. Right down to how he talked about not talking about his new deal.

“I don’t want to talk about this on the radio or anywhere else for that matter,” he wrote in an email to Boston radio station WEEI. “Athletes are always talking about money at a time when everyone else is struggling so badly to make it. We all make way more than our fair share. And I just think it reflects poorly on myself and my teammates.”

Before Pope Benedict canonizes him, it should be noted that Brady didn't exactly take a vow of poverty for New England owner Bob Kraft. He got a $30 million signing bonus and a lot more guaranteed money.

Besides, he’s not even the breadwinner in his household. Gisele Bundchen makes $45 million a year looking even prettier than her husband. That’s why she probably got dibs on the hot tub in the $20 million house they just built in Los Angeles.

Sacrifice is definitely a relative term here. But by industry standards, Brady took one for the team. His money was all but guaranteed anyway because the Patriots weren’t going to cut their icon.

And sure, Brady could have signed for the 10-year veteran’s minimum of $940,000 a year to really clear cap space. But you don’t see any other players taking 40 cents on all the dollars they could get.

Brady will average $9 million in the final three years of his deal. That immediately freed $15 million in cap space the next two years. Hopefully Brady insisted the Patriots use that to sign Wes Welker and a babysitter for Rob Gronkowski.

Almost every athlete says winning is the most important thing. Brady has put his lack of money where his mouth is. The NFL Players Association said it doesn’t comment on individual contracts, but the Brady Act can’t be sitting well down at the union hall.

The baseball union scuttled a deal in 2003 that would have sent Alex Rodriguez from Texas to Boston. It couldn’t swallow the thought of his average salary going from $27 million to $20 million.

NFL agents are dismissing Brady’s deal. They won’t allow it to financially impact anyone, but there will be a ripple effect. Carson Palmer is feeling it in Oakland, which wants to renegotiate the deal that will pay him $13 million next season.

With a $123 million salary cap, it’s tricky when one player gets one-sixth of the money. But that’s what quarterbacks like Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers and Peyton Manning are going for.

After his Super Bowl run, Joe Flacco wants more than all of them. When asked about Brady’s new deal, Flacco’s agent went, Tom Who?

“It doesn’t matter. It’s an extension for cap purposes,” Joe Linta told USA Today. “The bottom line is, whether Brady took a pay cut or took $27 million a year, it wouldn’t have an impact on what we’re doing.”

He has a point. Flacco didn’t invent the system. All he’s done is work hard for his payday and capitalize on it, as have the other quarterbacks. As has the guy in New England who has won more Super Bowls than any of them.

We shouldn’t go all Occupy Wall Street and demand they give up what they’ve earned. It’s just hard for us Iggy Pops in the 99 percent to grasp the need to make $22 million a year.

Why not settle for $18 million if it will help your team sign better players?

Winning is the most important thing, right?

That’s what Brady could ask his colleagues, assuming they got over the moat. He wouldn’t do it, of course, because he doesn’t want them to look bad.

Compared to Tom Brady, that usually can’t be helped. In this case, it could.